Sustainable design approach underpinned with Life Cycle Impact Assessment(LCIA) and ontology

Sustainable development has been a subject of global interest when people shift the focus from the economy and productivity only to the economy with consideration of the environment and resources on the earth. Manufacturing industry is one of the most crucial sectors that people focused on to make it more sustainable. However, the sustainability for current existing products are not enough to satisfy the requirement of sustainable development within the modern society. Therefore, an approach to design and to optimise product considering ecological impact is to be developed by this research. After review and comparison of popular LCIA methods and tools, the three-tier sustainable design approach considering human labour ecological impact is developed. Design optimisation with eco-constraints using genetic algorithm is followed. Moreover, from a product life cycle point of view, production may not be the least sustainable section. Use and disposal also play important roles in the whole product life cycle. In this case, Ontology is proposed in the research. It is a powerful tool to collect and exchange data of products and manage the relationships among different parts, properties of products, and suppliers in one specific area such as a factory or an industrial estate. Afterwards, The approach is validated by case study. Finally, the sustainable design approach underpinned with life cycle impact assessment (LCIA) and ontology is developed.

Name dc:type.qualificationname

phd

Level dc:type.qualificationlevel

doctoral

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

Nottingham Trent University

Year dc:date.issued

2013

Author dc:creator

• Ren, Z

Language dc:language

en